African Safari 2012 - The update thread

[Michelle_Nelson]

Have you thought about taking 1 of each of the 4 color phases of Springbuck and doing a combined floor pedestal.  Than taking the back 1/2 of all 4 and having the "flags" splayed trimmed to fit inside the recesed panels of the pedestal?

[Rob]

That would be a cool looking mount - I saw the link you sent me.  Very cool.  So many neat options with the African game.  I saw two fighting gemsbok that I really liked too.

The Springbok I think tend to prefer more arid habitat and are found in Namibia, south Africa and parts of the Kalahari.  I don't believe they have any in the part of Zim I am headed to.  I am pretty sure the Color phase Springbok are almost exclusive to South Africa (but I could be wrong - Ferdi could probably jump in with far more authority given this literally in his back yard!).

It might be the kind of mount you build over a few trips - just add heads as you collect them.  I have seen some neat tiny ten mounts like that too.  I think I saw one with several kinds of duikers that was pretty cool.

I think you should hook up with Ferdi and go after some color phase Springbok in South Africa!  Trips are pretty reasonably priced to SA!

[Michelle_Nelson]

There are so many different ideas for mounts.  You could put both a Blue and Black Wildebeest on a pedestal or the different speciese of Zebra.

I was thinking that since your going to be doing the croc where it hangs on the wall you could do a water sceen where the crock is coming out of the wall open mouth after the impala.  You could still do the 1/3 mount on the croc and do a 1/2 on the Impala as it is leaping out of reach of the croc.  It would put action into both mounts.   

[Rob]

That is an interesting concept.  I like it!

My reservation would be with the water.  I personally have not found I have liked the way water looks in mounts.  But that same concept could be done without water.

I am going to buy a couple of those toy rubber aligators and cut them up as a model to show Huffaker what I am looking for with a mount.  But first I need to get the croc...  and then I'll have to wait the year for the hides and horns to come back! 

I love those black Wildebeest!  Such pretty animals.  I love the hair on the nose and those white tails.

[fvh40]

That would be a cool looking mount - I saw the link you sent me.  Very cool.  So many neat options with the African game.  I saw two fighting gemsbok that I really liked too.

The Springbok I think tend to prefer more arid habitat and are found in Namibia, south Africa and parts of the Kalahari.  I don't believe they have any in the part of Zim I am headed to.  I am pretty sure the Color phase Springbok are almost exclusive to South Africa (but I could be wrong - Ferdi could probably jump in with far more authority given this literally in his back yard!).

It might be the kind of mount you build over a few trips - just add heads as you collect them.  I have seen some neat tiny ten mounts like that too.  I think I saw one with several kinds of duikers that was pretty cool.

I think you should hook up with Ferdi and go after some color phase Springbok in South Africa!  Trips are pretty reasonably priced to SA!

Hi Rob
Thanks for the heads up.
The different collours of Springbok makes a nice padastal, some guys come out here and hunt all 4 on a trip and call it the Springbuck grand slam.

Regards
Ferdi

[Rob]

Longtime with no updates.  I have been in a quiet time in regards to planning due to competing activities.  Time for an update.  First of all, only SIXTEEN Saturdays between me and departure!  Time is ticking away…

Finally got around to making a little progress with load development for the 450 Dakota. 

As I think I said earlier, I plan to shoot The Cutting Edge Bullets – The BBW#13 450 Grain Solid, and the matched BBW#13 420 Grain NonCon.  This is a departure from traditional bullets shot from this gun.  Tradition says shoot a 500 grain matched set of solids/expanding bullets at 2,400 FPS.   From what I have read (and my thoughts on this can be found earlier on this thread) These lighter Cutting edge  bullets have better terminal performance in terms of penetration and, in the case of the NonCon, damage than traditional soft points, and round nose bullets.  The secret for the solid is in the 67% flat meplat, and with the NonCon, the petal separation.  For more info, see this thread:
http://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/4711043/m/2861098911

Here is my plan of attack:
 1. Find a load that will get the 450 grain solid moving at least 2400 FPS
2. Test that load for accuracy on the bench (I will be happy with 1 inch groups at 100 yards)
3. If the load is not accurate, then tweak it up or down to get the 1 inch groups.
4. Find a load for the NonCon that gets a similar Muzzle velocity to Solid
5.  Shoot a test group with the solids and matched MV NonCons and see if they group.
6.  Adjust the NonCon load up or down until it allows me to get a 1-1.5 inch group at 100 yards with the mixed bullet types.
7.  Test the same combo at 50 yards to see if the group stays together.

That should set me up with the 450 Dakota.  Hoping I can get this done with 25 or fewer shots.  We shall see!

Starting with the Solid, I loaded up a couple rounds each of 4 powder weights, going up one grain of powder for each step.  (Powder was H 4350, and charges were 103, 104, 105, and 106 grains).  I believe at 107 grains I will be at 100% of the case capacity.  I could probably go as high as 108 or 109 grains with a little compression.

I made it out today and got the results seen at the bottom of the page.  (no signs of pressure even on the heaviest load).  I was very pleased with the consistency of the velocity readings. 

I am happy with the velocities with the 106 grain loads so I am going to test those for accuracy next.

I also re-ran sectional density, Muzzle Energy and Momentum values for this load and compared it to a 500 grain bullet for kicks.  The results are in the last table below.  I loose 10% in Sectional Density, 7% in momentum, and 314 foot-pounds of muzzle Energy by going to the CEB BBW#13.  I believe this is more than made up by the advantages of the bullet shape, and the NonCon performance.

[Rob]

Twig Rig test for deflection
I want to see what happens to a BBW#13 Solid does when it hits a twig between the target and the shooter.  Some friends of mine and I chatted about this last week  and came up with some ideas.
 
Goals:
-See if there is significant deflection caused by hitting a twig between the target and the muzzle.
-See if different bullets have different results (i.e. Flat nose Solids, Round nose solids, expanding/fragmenting)

Bullets to test:
1.   CEB BBW#13 450 grain Solid
2.   CEB 420 Grain NonCon
3.   Barnes Round Nose Solid
4.   Swift A-Frame

Expectations:
I expect to see some deflection by the twigs, but that the deflections will be minor.  i.e. maybe a couple inches one way or another.  I do not expect to see massive deflection (like off the paper).  The one exception might be the NonCon and/or the swift A-frame.  If the impact starts the expansion/shearing process, then it might be possible that this would cause some deflection.  Basically, if the test proves that the deflection is half minute of buffalo, then I don’t see this as significant. 

Twig Rig Plans and approach of the setup
The plan is to build a twig block about 8 inches by 8 inches that is set up in such a way as to not permit a .458 bullet to pass through it without striking one or more "twigs".  My twigs will be 1/4 inch pine dowels. I will set up a target at 50 yards, and plan to shoot through the twig block at 35 yards (15 yards from the target).  See diagram:




The build: 
I was able to build this in about an hour.  It pretty much came out looking just as I designed it to be.  I made it so that you could replace the dowels as they got shot up by just sliding them out the top of the block.  (bullet in photo is a Woodleigh hydro which was not used in testing…)



Test on 6/16:
I tested this in the field on Saturday 6/16.  The rig set up pretty easily:
 


Zero time
Once Set up, I took a couple test shots to zero and make sure the CEB Solid and the Round Nose were both hitting the bull at 50 yards (Since each bullet type has a different charge, MV and BC, I wanted to see there was not a drastic difference in Point Of Impact (POI)  between them.  They both went into the Bull within a couple inches of each other on the vertical axis, and within an inch on the horizontal axis.  Good enough for me.

The shots
I tested the four bullets over a total of 8 shots:
#1-Solid CEB 450 Grain BBW#13
---This one went in between two dowels and evenly punched a hole through both sides-like a hole punch.  Bullet was about 1.25 inches from the shot I took to test zero.
#2-Solid CEB 450 Grain BBW#13
---Since #1 hit two dowels evenly, I wanted to try another one.  This one hit a single dowel and cut a half moon through it.  Impact was within an inch of #1, and within a half inch of the zero test POI.
#3:  Barnes RN Banded Solid 500 Grain
---Cut a dowel cleanly in half.  Bullet was about 1.25 inches from the shot I took without the twigs to test zero. 
#4:  Barnes RN Banded Solid 500 Grain
---Cut the dowel cleanly in half.  Could not find the bottom part of the dowel.  Landed within 3/8 of an inch from the zero test bullet.
#5:  Barnes RN Banded Solid 500 Grain
---Cut Dowel cleanly in half.  Landed within an inch of the zero shot.
#6:  CEB NonCon 420 Grain (No Talon tip)
---Cut dowel cleanly in half.  Landed less than an inch away from Shots 1 and 2
#7:  CEB NonCon 420 Grain (No Talon tip)
---Cut Dowel cleanly in half.  Bullet landed about an inch from #1,2 and 6
#8:  Swift A-Frame 500 Grain
---Not the best impact on the dowels.  It more grazed the dowel.  Almost like it pushed the dowel out of the way as the dowel next to it had no marks, bu the impression on the damaged downwas too little to have allowed the .458 caliber bullet to pass through.  Regardless the bullet stayed in the Bull and had a POI near the Barnes RN Banded solid.

Here are a couple photos of impacted dowels in the holder:



Here are photos of the damaged dowels:

 


Here are the targets:



My interpretations:
Well, This is not a lot of data to make a decision on, but it would seem that if one of these heavy bullets hits a ¼ inch twig that is roughly equal or less than the harness of pine, no significant deflection occurs at these ranges.   Each Bullet was a different load, yet the total group size of all 8 shots was about 4 inches tall, and 1 to 1.5 inches wide. 

I was surprised at how surgical the impacts were on the wood.  I had expected to see wood splinters everywhere, but that was not the case.  It was interesting to note that the flat point CEB’s seemed to hole punch the wood, whereas the others – especially the Round Nose bullets, seemed to push through the wood.

Hitting a twig on the way to the target did not start the shearing process on the NonCons as I did not see any petal impacts on the paper.

If Hitting a twig caused the A-Frame to start expansion, it sure did not provide any empirical evidence and this leads me to believe it did not do so. 

All in all a fun test.  If I do this again, I will have to try with a twig at 10 yards, and the target at 50 to see if having more distance between the target  and the twig does anything unusual.

[Rob]

Some frustrating turn of events have occurred this month.  Thought I would share them.

First:  I went to Eastern Wa to do some testing this weekend and continue work on my load development for the NonCon that will match my Solid.  I got the data but I have not processed it yet.  Short story is, the NonCons were not as consistent as the solids in terms of velocities, but I am not too worried about that and they should work just fine.  The bad news however is that I found that I am having feeding issues with the solids.

My focus thus far has been on single shots with nothing in the magazine. They have all shot and fed well. They also feed just fine when I load up the mag and just dry cycle the shells through the gun (without firing)

I tried rapid fire-multiple shot from a standing position over the weekend. Here is what I did:
-Loaded up three shells in the mag.
-Opened the bolt and chambered the top shell
-Fired the gun
-Opened the bolt and it extracted the old shell
-When trying to close the bolt, the shell would bind as it was sliding into the chamber (this happened 2 out of two attempts)
I tried this same experiment several times with a round nose and the second shell chambered without issue.

The CEB bullets are seated so that the crimp sits just behind second band


I have cross posted this in the AR forum asking for advice and it sounds like there are two options.  Seat the bullet deeper (to the top band), and have the left rail looked at to see if it needs tuning.  I’ll do some research on this and see what comes of it.

The second issue is more disturbing.  Terry Anders (the PH we are hunting with) has been evicted from his concession by some “partners”.  Basically this is part of the repatriation of land issues that have been coming up in Zimbabwe.  This was a known risk when we booked the hunt, but the chances seemed somewhat remote. 

The good news is, we are booked with a reputable outfitter and between he and Terry, I am confident we will get a hunt of equal or better quality.  I understand other operators in the area are working with Terry and offering up the ability for him to run his booked hunts on their concessions. 

More to follow on this.  I am not happy about it, and my heart goes out to Terry and his wife as they are fighting courts to get their land back (they were given 24 hours to get off the land) while trying to run hunts to keep food on the table.  This is where doing your research and booking with folks of integrity gives you more confidence in the outcome when thing start to turn sour. 

[Rob]

Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

only 12 more Saturdays to go before we are on a plane headed to Jo-Berg!

Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!

[Rob]

Well, got back out to the range to finish off the load development.

Not too impressed with my shooting, but I have the data I need.

In the photo below, I color coded the shots:
Purple: 450 grain CEB Solid, 106 grains of H4350
Green: 420 grain CEB NonCon, 104 grains of H4350
Yellow: 420 grain CEB NonCon, 103.5 grains of H4350

This was off the bench, using a sissy pad, 100 yards, 6x scope.

Looks to me as though I dramatically pulled one of the 104 grain NonCons pretty bad so I culled that shot. It also looks as though I might have slightly pulled one each of the 104 and 103.5 grain NonCons-one right, one left. But those are not way out there.

I shot another mix bag set and got similar results. Based on this data, it would seem that 0.5 grains has little impact on POI. So I plan to go with 104 grains of H4350 in the NonCon.

So Loads are done for all three rifles:
450 Dakota: 
#1:  450 grain CEB Solid with 106 grains of H4350 MV= 2525 ME=6370 ft pounds
#2:  420 grain CEB NonCon with 104 grains of H4350 MV= 2452  ME= 5606 ft pounds

375 HH Mag
#1:  300 grain CEB Solid with 69 grains of RL19 MV=2479, ME=4093
#2:  275 Grain CEB NonCon with 68 grains fo RL 19 MV=2478, ME=3749

.223 Remington
40 grain Hornady V-Max with 21.4 grains of I4198 MV=3400fps ME = 1026   

[lhrbull]

just got back from SA and had a great time that exceeded every promise

[Rob]

just got back from SA and had a great time that exceeded every promise

This post sucks....  We need a full report with photos!

[h20hunter]

Agreed.....not worthy to be a part of your thread. It should be taken down and followed up by a fully detailed description and photo essay.

[Rob]

Drama drama drama!

Well, as of this time, all the operators on the Save in Zim have been shut out of their hunting by the government. 

We have been given a plan b place to hunt in the Limpopo region of Zim that looks to be outstanding.  It is called Sentinel.  http://www.sentinellimpoposafaris.com/.  80,000 acres of unfenced land to hunt.

In other news, I got the 450 Dakota feeding issue resolved.  Here is an update:

Two fellow Accurte Reloading folks gave me recommendations of big bore smiths to help with the feeding issue: 
-Darcie Echols (http://www.echolsrifles.com/) in Utah
-Steve Button in Olympia.

Being that Steve is local to me, I called him and chatted with him. He felt he could probably fix the issue for me, but he was leaving for China in 2 weeks and would not be back until 8/1. He said to call him when he returned and he would take care of my issue. My worry was, with my trip coming up in October, waiting till August to have it worked on would leave little time to get it back and tested prior to departure. I decided to chance it.

I called him on 8/2, reached him on 8/3 and had it to his shop on 8/4! I saw some of his work and he is an artist. He looked it over and cycled one of the 6 dummy rounds I brought to him through the gun about 40 times. The issue was that shells coming off the left rail were popping up nose first at too extreme of an angle to allow the flat nosed bullets feed properly into the chamber and instead they were binding on the top of the chamber. He said he would turn my rifle in under a week and that he would beat up my dummy rounds beyond use as he would cycle the gun hundreds of times and that was pretty rough on brass and bullets. True to his word he called me the next Wednesday and said “this is as good as it is going to get!” Not feeling totally at ease with that declaration, I asked for him to expand on that. He said it was feeding just fine now, but it was not as smooth as he would have liked. That was fine with me.

I picked it up on 8/11 and took it out to a clear cut on my way home to shoot it. There was a lot of metal grit in the action from his work so I blew it all out with some oil and put 10 flawless rounds through her. Blowing out the grit smoothed out the cycling roughness too. I will do a comprehensive cleaning and that should totally clear that up. Here is what Steve did:
1. tuned the left rail to have the shell pop up in more of a horizontal manner
2. Re-polished the feed ramp.
3. Re-shaped the rear end of the box magazine a little
4. Played around with the box mag spring a little.
This seems to have fixed it up and that makes me very happy!

Only 6 more Saturdays left till we are on the plane!

[Rob]

Agreed.....not worthy to be a part of your thread. It should be taken down and followed up by a fully detailed description and photo essay.

yes.  We demand a detailed description and photo essay...

NOW!